Ulysses
by Progenitus
Summary: Edward used to be something-something great. Now, stranded where he belongs not: leaving only to strive for the impossible, to seek for truth, to find his way back, and not to yield. [After Conqueror of Shamballa, and both brothers are stuck in London.]


**Ulysses**

_Open your eyes now. I will. One moment. Has all vanished since? If I open and am for ever in the black adiaphane. Basta! I will see if I can see._

_See now. There all the time without you: and ever shall be, world without end._

* * *

He used to be something—something great.

He used to be dazzling as the sun, with a mind sharp and brilliant as any diamond. He used to be revered, worshiped, loved, feared. He used to be able to clap his hands and change the world, with just a swift movement, a flick of his wrists and a taut jerk of his arms, palms together (clammy with sweat and anticipation, dust and dirt in streaks; sometimes dried, clustered blood too), a loud cackle in the air, and then—light. (A flash, really, like a gleaming lamp being abruptly turned on then flicked off; or violent lightning in a violent storm.) Oh, and when he walked out onto the streets, graphite pavement underneath his feet, steel and wires absorbing the heat or cold in the air, sunshine or rain enviously beating on his hair, his braid that momma used to make for him—oh, the people around would pause, their eyes shifting towards him (he refrained from shouting anything about his height, as his paranoia was prone to do), they make a tiny gulp, almost as if whispering _"This is Him, this is He"_, and go back to their interrupted conversation, laughing loudly and stiffly, sharing an non-existent joke about nothing. But that had nothing, _nothing_, on what he was in battle. Sheer beauty, when he would straighten, eyes brimming with such determination that they pierced through the tense air and straight into his enemies' hearts.

He remembered being told that when his golden eyes held such a gleam, even hearts of stone would weep, and despair.

His hair was the sun, the _sun_, and his eyes the color of old gold, ancient gold, older than any Armstrong blood—but he was larger than life, larger than them all, even baby brother Al, who was so tall that it pained him to look at, so tall, so far into the sky when he looked up, that he couldn't control a small, unnoticeable twitch in his hands (his right hand, the one that should have been, should still be, blood and flesh and bones), to grasp onto something invisible around him. Of course he was larger, how else was he able to soothe Al, hugging his head tightly (should have been, should still be, _is_, his head, hair spun sunshine like his own, eyes wide and trusting—so heart-achingly trusting, even when, especially when, Ed's own stupidity and recklessness got the best of him).

_Everything is alright—it's okay—hush now, and everything will be alright._

Except it wasn't. Not now—not here, where he wasn't anything like that.

He still struck fear into others, but not for deeds he have done, nor the terrible powers he held; they feared his eyes, blazing with passion for rocketry, smothering all sanity. They said it was a sure sign of madness, god bless his young heart. He merely avoided talk, turning to yet another blueprint or research paper, fluttering in the intensity of his gaze. He knew what his eyes looked like; he recognized that light, wild and fanatical, because he had seen it before, many times; and sometimes in his nightmares, Tucker would still stare at him with those eyes, until they turned into his, and then darkness devoured.

Winter came.

The wind was full of destruction outside. (Ed hurled a book aside.) The frame of his windows creaked, continuing their decades-long song, beckoning to the wind, lamenting their old age and reassuring the swaying branches. (Al sighed, reaching out a warm hand only to be brushed aside rudely, and sighed again.) The last few leaves, shuffling in the wind, wept for their ephemeral life. (The book laid on the floor, its pages splattered against the ground.) The wind, evermore prying, ripped and tore the veil of weeping, muffling the groaning of the windows, making way for the distinctive thick bitterness of early winter. (Ed slumped, face in hands, as the air in the room thickened.)

It seemed like every day was tragically the same. They said it was the coldest winter in many long years.

Spring approached, gingerly, slithering around the corner and cautiously blending into the days, hastening the sun to rise, heaving it up from hoary clouds, kissing it aglow; lingering touches as it set, refusing to let the orange disc go, breathing fiery wisps against the sky, afraid it might not return, leaving eternal night. But return it did, every day, and the cycle resumed. (Ed spent his days in the lab, and his nights flashing agonizingly bright smiles at his little brother, who was growing up finally. This entailed a new interest in people other than his older brother—his world, his life, his purpose—and fond words of a girl flowing off his tongue so naturally, as if they weren't the only ones in this world, alone, so utterly alone.)

Summer, then autumn again, and that winter was even colder than the one before. Snow trickled down tenderly before the last dying leaves fell, and the streets were powdered white until footsteps and tire tracks made muddled gray stains, almost like the bruises he used to have. (Al put a ring to his girl and yes she said yes she will Yes. They were married in the blistering cold, something about a white wedding that Ed didn't understand fully—didn't try, because as soon as he saw the painfully modest ring, he knew he had lost Al forever. It didn't matter that he would visit, or they would spend the holidays together—the _wrong_ holidays, not the ones from back home, when he could kick back and relax without having to glare at Mustang and shout and be insulted by unintentional-maybe intentional-blunders about his height that was no longer a problem now five years after. Height didn't matter nothing mattered nothing happened, because now he really was all so very alone.)

_He was the only one trying._

It wasn't that Al gave _up_, not precisely, because he still would make inquiries about any development, to make his brother happy—but then again, Al had always been rather adaptive and accepting of new changes. He didn't even seem to mind the armor much, not like the passionate dread and self-loathing that Ed bore. So this time, instead of being a team, with Mustang and Hawkeye and _all those people_—god, it had been so long, their faces were turning blurry like frayed photographs, and their voices mingled until it was one upsetting blob—this time, he did it _alone_.

He could, he would. He had his visions nightly, sometimes in the spare moments when he cupped his coffee before sipping it in the morning, when the sun hit the glassed windows of the library at just the right angle to light up the expanse between the door and his gloves that he took up to wearing because the white crispness was a whip, a pleasant whip that reminded him of what he came to the library for—no, not the sun, but the future that he might thrust into his past. The air hung heavy with droplets of alchemy, of formulas that he was sure he still knew, and this was the moment that it all seemed possible; not at night, not the shifting moment of waking, and certainly not when baby Al visited (now with his _wife_, Ed would spit out the word like Winry used to spit fire at him, who was really a fine and dashing girl, if Ed was into that sort of thing). Al would smile why would he smile he would touch his lips to where the girl's dimple met the corner of her mouth and tucked a kiss there, neatly, secretively, like how people hid away photos of family, like how Hawkeye hid her soft smile and Mustang hid his care and Havoc carefully hid his envy and Maes hid nothing, because the dead could not lie.

_The coffee was cold._

FTL propulsion systems were still a dream, but he had already artificially established a separate space-time bubble. The utilization of dark energy to propel is under another department, but that had never stopped him before. Still, there is a long, _long_ way to go before anything stable can be created. What frustrated him was that he couldn't use alchemy to put any theory into experimentation—he was an alchemist, first and foremost (since Al had run away, rendering his status as a 'brother' quite superfluous, and he was useless as a soldier in the face of guns and bombs), what was he then, if that identity had been stripped away?

_What was he?_

He still clapped his hands, out of habit, but it was nothing like lightning and thunder now—it was a shrill, stark sound, like the whistling wind before an autumn storm, haunting and ominous. He wished he could still hear his thunder, wished so fiercely that he felt he could burn; and when it rained—when it thundered—he felt he _was_ burning.

They whisper, when his back is turned and they think a child—a young man, cannot hear; they whisper of the next Lorentz or Einstein, but jealousy taint their voices, so the whispers are clutches that claw their way towards him, taunting him, laughing at his diamond of a mind, jesting at the possibilities that he will never have. His days are shrouded in such whispers, and his nights are no better, lost in old voices spreading, old steps shuffling, old memories expanding, until the wind is silent under the door.

He used to be something—something great.

_He still can be._

* * *

Author's Note: Quote at the beginning is from James Joyce's _Ulysses_, namesake of this story. Although Tennyson's _Ulysses_ would fit just as well.

Cover art is from the game _Journey_.


End file.
